Paul di Resta planning for dry British Grand Prix

The Scot, who starts 10th by virtue of his team-mate Nico Hulkenberg's five-place grid penalty for a gearbox change, said that his side of the garage had gambled on a dry set-up, while the German was running with wet weather in mind.

"We are not in a bad position," said di Resta. "I think we just caught out with the weather [on Saturday]. We were stuck in a window where we couldn't really balance the car with what we wanted to do. We gambled with it being a showery qualifying session that was more likely to be dry. The intensity of what came through wasn't forecast and you never thought it would be a show stopper.

"All I'm saying is we are crossing our fingers for dry [on Sunday], certainly for most of the race.

"I don't think we are screwed [if it rains], but it will be different on higher fuel. All I'm saying is that we didn't give ourselves the best chance for an extremely wet qualifying. We narrowly missed, it was very close to getting through to Q3.

"I think as well we were more competitive in the conditions when it was inters, than on extremes. If we would have been further up I don't know."

Teams forecasts varied on Sunday morning, with most expecting at least light showers during some point in the race.